Back at Your Door
by Genevieve Darcy Granger
Summary: Negan breaks out, but not how you think.


Negan was curled up in his bed, not quite yet asleep. The moonlight has managed to reach his cell tonight despite being filtered through the smattering of clouds, the window, and the bars. The clouds, though overall wispy, brought the promise of late spring rain. It would pitter patter outside and seep Negan's cinderblock enclosure with an inescapable coldness. Already chilled to the bone, Negan curled the thread-bare blanket around him tighter to stave it off. He never got used to sleeping alone again after Lucille died. It has been so long now.

With a soft grunt, Negan rolled on his side, facing the wall and traced his fingertips over it. He wondered if Michonne did the same as him, if she imagined Rick's face when she reached for the other side of the bed, if she breathed his name when her fingers skated across her stomach ever lower. Mostly, Negan wondered if she talked to him.

After the whole ordeal with Maggie and the crushing news delivered that his Lucille was still out there somewhere, when someone finally told him that Rick was gone, it was his tipping point. Negan plunged fully into madness, and it seemed only natural that he fell back on old habits. He started talking to the dead, hallucinating their ghosts and their fucked-up corpses. One day, Negan never stepped foot out of bed because he just saw piles of bodies on the floor – one of them being Glenn, with his eye popped out of its socket and everything. The stench of iron blood clogged his nostrils and choked his throat for days afterwards.

For the most part, though, the dead did not cross the bars, but stayed forever on the other side, out of reach and mocking him. Rick was almost a frequent visitor as Lucille, and he definitely stuck around longer.

Eventually, Father Gabriel managed to breath some sanity back into him, and it helped, too, when Michonne would visit and they would share moments of grief together. Siddiq was a big help, forcing Negan to take care of his body and eat and bathe. Hell, Siddiq gave him plenty of sponge baths and Negan just laid there and took it, overwhelmed by the sensation of bare skin against his after spending so much time in here with ghosts who passed right through him or lingered at a distance.

Of course, the only person who really inscribed some self-worth into him again was Judith Grimes. She had snuck into his cell once and Negan hadn't known who the hell she was because it had been so long since he'd seen her. She had been about five or so at the time.

 _"Why does Momma come and see you so much?" The blonde girl on the other side of the bars asked him._

 _"Um." Negan blinked at her and wondered if she was another ghost. "Who is your mom?"_

 _Cocking her head, Judith bunched her hair up in her hands. "Momma Michonne."_

 _Understanding dawned on him, and Negan nearly cried. He should've seen the resemblance she had to Rick. "Oh, um…she takes care of me. I'm…I'm a bad man and she makes sure that I won't hurt anyone else."_

 _"Who are you?"_

 _"You don't remember me, angel?"_

 _Judith looked sad. "People ask me that all the time, asking me about other people, too. Dead people. Momma asks me all the time if I remember Daddy and my brother – my other brother."_

 _"Other…brother?"_

 _"Uh huh. I have two. Carl's in heaven, but RJ is just a baby. He looks like Momma."_

 _Negan tried to filter through his most recent memories of Michonne. He couldn't remember her ever being pregnant. Well, it was hard to keep track of time. She probably had him pretty soon after Rick, and Negan was too much of a wreck to notice that. "Does RJ mean Rick Junior?"_

 _"Uh huh, after Daddy." Judith cocked her head. "Did you know Daddy? Lots of people did."_

 _"Yeah, I knew your daddy. He was…" Negan choked slightly. "He was a good man. He took care of me, too."_

Blinking away the memory, Negan rolled on his back again. Sleep was hard to come by, even though it was one of Negan's frequent hobbies besides reading, throwing that ball, or playing with himself. When he did sleep, he dreamed, and he had a very vivid imagination. Back when Rick was alive, Negan had plenty of wet dreams about him, but now those were few and far in between. One starred Siddiq, and more recently Gabriel. With a sigh, Negan tossed his arms over his eyes, blocking out the moonlight. Would he ever get to rest?

Suddenly a soft voice like the coo of a dove spoke to him. "Negan?"

Immediately sitting up in bed, Negan was startled to see Judith standing outside his cell. His hand immediately came up to shield his face from her flashlight, and he noticed that she had her hat and boots on, and her sword and gun. Uh oh. "Judith? What are you doing up, angel? You need to go to bed."

"Mom didn't come back today."

Negan bit his lip. He knew that Judith was old enough now to know that if people didn't come back after two days, that usually meant they were dead. However, Negan had also heard some chatter outside his window today. Apparently, Rosita and Eugene went missing on an errand for Gabriel, and the Catholic guilt was really eating him up. There had been talk, whisperers about whisperers. Something was out there, either a big walker herd or some other threat. It was too dangerous to be out on the road or by oneself. People needed allies.

"You want to go look for her," Negan realized, and then sighed. He dragged his feet out of bed and flinched when he realized the ground was too cold. Settling for crossing his legs in bed, Negan rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and chided, "Jude, you can't go out there by yourself and especially not in the dark." Yanking his hands away, he glanced out the window. "I bet it's gonna rain, too. Don't go, Jude. Your mom is gonna come back."

"They said that about Daddy, too." Judith didn't sound sad. If anything, she sounded like she was already a teenager, but with as much angst as there was in her life, Negan wasn't surprised. "Daddy never came back. I'm going to find Mom."

"Judith, what if…what if you don't like what you find?"

Judith lifted her chin. "Then I should be the one to do it. She's my mom. I should do it."

Chuffing out a breath, Negan looked at the floor and then back up at her again. "Jude, I couldn't even do it for my wife. It's not like killing those other dead ones. You know her – because she's your mom. And, and it's not the same." How could he tell her that Michonne's body would be missing chunks, that she would have a different kind of stench like fresh rot, that when the blade would pierce through her skull it would be harder to push and that her body would be heavier, juicier, and blood would spray? How could he tell this little girl any of that when she was already braver than him? How could he tell Judith anything when he was a murderer, all too intimate with death and the way skulls collapsed.

Looking like she was resisting the urge to stomp her boot, Judith shook her head so vigorously that her hair whipped against her cheeks. "I don't care! I'm going to do it for her, because I couldn't do it for Daddy! No one was able to do it for Daddy!"

Negan's eyes went round. He had always suspected that she took Rick's death too well, and for a while he wondered if it was because she clung to the same delusions as Michonne that Rick was still alive out there. For a while there was even a cult in Alexandria, claiming that Rick would rise again and when he would return, he would bring the cure that would ensure all dead would be properly put to rest. Negan didn't necessarily believe them, but he liked to watch them march around outside his little window. They were really creative in their songs, too. Hell, Negan was hoping that they would build a statue. Unfortunately, Michonne, Siddiq, and Gabriel had not tolerated that and they quickly smothered it. In the apocalypse, people clung too precariously to their hopes, allowing it to drug their minds and cloud their judgements. Michonne recognize this for the danger it was and that's when she stopped her delusions about Rick. They had a funeral for him and everything.

But Judith…Negan wasn't sure if she remembered their sermons, but he knew some people kneeled in the streets to her. He wondered if that power over people affected her like it had affected him. She was a child, though, so he doubted it. Now, though, he wasn't so sure.

"No one else wants to help me." Judith marched up to the wall and grabbed the key that had been out of Negan's reach for so long like it was nothing. "Gabe doesn't even wanna help go get Rosita. They all told me to stay here. Alexandria takes care of Alexandria," she recited. She fumbled with the old lock, but then she got it open easily. Businesslike and efficient, Judith returned the key to the wall and when she turned back around and saw that Negan hadn't moved from his bed, she frowned at him. "What are you doing?" Her hands flapped at him, urging him to come out. "Come on! We gotta go!"

He felt like he was frozen in place as he stared at his way to freedom. He'd been here eight years, maybe longer, and he never thought he'd get out. After all this time, Negan firmly believed that he was going to die in here. That one day, they would just get tired of him, and they'd come inside and beat him to death. But of all the ways to finally get out of the cell, he never thought it would be this easy. More or less, he half expected someone to forget to lock it than for someone to willingly open it for him.

"Negan!" Judith interrupted his thoughts. "I need someone's help. Aren't you going to help me?"

Melting slightly, Negan cautiously climbed out of bed. This time he didn't even wince when ice cold shot up his legs from the soles of his feet. With a soft rasping noise, his bare feet whispered over the hard, unforgiving floor, but once he reached the cell door, he hesitated. Despite everything inside him that yearned for freedom, there was still a part of him that wanted to stay for the simple comforts and the isolation. The last time Rick Grimes had seen him, Negan was in the cell. If Rick were to ever come back and Negan weren't in the cell.

"Negan, please!" Judith pleaded and she reached for his hand. With her small hand grasping his, she tugged on his arm insistently, and Negan stepped over the threshold. As soon as he was outside the bars, he felt his posture straighten like a weight was lifted from his shoulders. Judith pulled him outside into the crisp night air and Negan felt so small in this brand-new world.

Of course, Judith was confident. She grew up here, knew every nook and cranny, and she led him through a shortcut in the tomato patch. "We only keep guards on the walls. Right now, with a lot of the security team gone, it'll be easy to leave. Father Gabriel is on gate duty, but I know a wall we can sneak out."

He was listening to her, but as he walked over the bare dirt, Negan was more focused on how the soft soil squashed between his toes, rich and black, clinging to him like a second skin. Slowing to a halt, he stopped just to look at the stars. They were brighter under open sky than from his window.

"What is it?" Judith asked, not understanding why his eyes brimmed with tears.

Shaking his head, Negan thumbed the tears away. "It's nothing." As he took a calming breath, he looked around him curiously before he found a shovel and picked it up. The heft of it in his palms was comforting, but not as familiar as Lucille would be. Nothing could replace her, but he would have to make do. "We can't leave yet, Jude. I don't even have any shoes." A stiff wind cut through his clothes and Negan shivered, tightening in on himself. "And I need a jacket."

"Let's go back to my house. I think we have stuff."

Negan didn't even dare to breathe. Did Michonne really keep his clothes after all these years – after Rick died? He hadn't expected that from her.

When they reached the house, Judith led him up the stairs, her boots loud against the fancy hardwood floors. "Don't worry. RJ is at our babysitter's Nova's house. She watched the kids when the parents are gone." Judith fiddled with the pistol on her belt, nervous as she led Negan to her mother's room. The floorboard creaked underfoot. "Nova's watching Gracie, too. Aaron's gone."

"Don't worry, kid. That many people out there, they're all watching each other's backs." His hand briefly resting on her shoulder as a gesture of comfort, and then he stepped around her into Michonne's room. He felt haunted again as he looked around curiously and he took note of how it still felt like Rick still lived here.

As he rummaged through the closet, he found Michonne's old maternity clothes and some of Rick's clothes, too. When Judith wasn't looking, Negan fingered one of Rick's plaid shirts and brought it up to his nose. It smelled like laundry detergent. He brushed it across his cheek. It was soft.

At the very back of the closet, he found his old leather jacket, creaky, but otherwise unaged. No cracks in the leather. Negan slid it on like it was second-nature even after everything, and it felt like he had armor again and he was invincible. "Your mom keep any extra weapons around? Like a bat?" He dared to hope.

"No, most of the weapons are at the arsenal." Judith shook her head. "We're not gonna be able to get in there. You'll have to keep the shovel."

Looking down at the spade, Negan considered it. It was a little unwieldy, but it would certainly get the job done, and it was a range weapon like he preferred. "Alright."

"You still need shoes." Judith pointed to his bare feet where he had inadvertently tracked dirt into her mother's room. She didn't seem bothered about it.

"I don't think your mom is my size, kiddo."

Gnawing at her bottom lip, Judith turned around and walked over to the other side of the bed. After lowering herself on her hands and knees and rummaging for a bit, she pulled out a shoebox and offered it to him. Negan took it and inside were a brand-new pair of boots – brown with a pointed toe. It was the same style as Rick's, although definitely never worn. Negan's heart jumped in his throat and he choked on it.

"Mom said she got this for Daddy before he died. His old ones had been resewn three times already. She never had the chance to give them to him."

"Jude, I," Negan looked up at her and offered her the box back, "I can't wear these."

"Then you won't have any shoes," she pointed out.

Feeling helpless, Negan took the boots out of the box. Surprisingly, they were his size, though he had always thought Rick to have had smaller feet than him. Apparently, he was wrong. It felt weird to be wearing shoes again, and it was definitely going to suck walking in these and breaking them in, but Negan wasn't a hobbit and this was the best he could do. When they'd get back, though, (and Negan was sure they were going to come back), he was going to put the boots back in the box.

After lacing them up, Negan stood to his full height and took a few steps. His footsteps echoed like Judith's, and Negan nodded at her. "Alright, Jude. One last thing before we go. You need a jacket. It's cold out there."

Rolling her eyes, Judith said, "Fine." She went to her room, and Negan trailed after her, not sure of what else he could do. While Judith went to her closet and shouldered on her fleece-lined jacket, Negan glanced around her room until his eyes fell on a picture. It was obviously an older picture because the colors were so faded and her letters were crooked like the hand of a beginner. Negan also knew it was older because while Judith labeled it as a picture of her family, RJ wasn't in it yet, and Rick still had his long curly hair.

Pressing his lips together, Negan looked back at Rick's only daughter as she struggled to zip up her jacket. Was he really going to let her lead him out into the world against a new threat?

Once she was ready to go, Judith fluffed out her hair. "Okay, we're going now, alright?"

"Wait just a minute. I need to go back to the cell. I forgot something." Negan walked ahead of her, hiding his face as he took the stairs two at a time. The boots were still comfortable on his feet.

"What did you forget?" Judith asked, but he didn't answer, instead choosing to let her follow him back to his basement. She kept close to his side, surprisingly patient and all too trusting. It was too easy for Negan to shove her inside the cell and slam the door into place. Judith stumbled, but luckily didn't fall, and the door slammed shut so hard that Negan heard the lock click.

"Negan!" Judith spun around and grabbed the door, shaking at the bars. The door held, but Negan stepped back all the same, ashamed of himself. "Negan, what are you doing? Why did you put me in here?"

"It's too dangerous for you out there, angel. I can't just…You need to stay here. I'll go rescue your family."

"No, you won't!" Judith shouted and she stuck her arms through the bars to reach him. Her fingers clawed uselessly at the air. "Let me out, Negan! I have to go! She's my mom! I have to! I have to!" She started to sob, and Negan's heart broke.

"Please don't cry. Someone will let you out in the morning. You can tell them it's my fault and I tried you."

"No!" Judith stomped her boot and then jumped backwards. The pistol was in her hands before Negan could even blink. She pointed the muzzle at his chest and fat tears leaked down her cheeks as she glared at him, betrayed. "Let me out or I'll shoot you."

Slowly shaking his head from side to side, Negan stood his ground. "Then shoot me. But I'm not going to let you follow me. I know you can take care of yourself under normal circumstances, Jude, but right now you just need to stay here. Who's gonna be here for RJ?" He reminded her.

Judith's small hands cradling the gun wavered and finally she dropped her hands. "I hate you," she hiccupped, and her brown eyes were hateful like Negan has never seen before.

"It's okay that you hate me. Lots of people do." Negan swung the shovel up on his shoulder, careful not to knock the spade against the side of his head. "But at least you're alive to hate me."

Then he left Alexandria, and he heard Judith wailing from the cell, calling for someone to rescue her. In the distraction, he slipped out between the front gate easily and closed it behind him again. And then he oriented himself for the Hilltop, wondering if his memory was still good or if the landscape had changed too much for him to find his way. But he had a promise to keep to her, and Negan was going to die trying. He owed it to Judith, but more importantly, he owed it to Rick.


End file.
